Afghanistan

[OwlHoot]

Latest theory is that the Yanks deliberately left a shedload of hardware for the Taliban, to allow the latter to be a bigger thorn in the side of China!

Also, apparently China's President Xi has asked the Taliban to go easy on Biden because he's "their guy".

You can't make this stuff up (although perhaps someone did).

[OwlHoot]

Interesting article on Afghanistan here, by the guy who literally wrote the book on it.

Among other things, it seems to confirm my suspicion that foreign occupations there advance the country two steps forward, or at least one and a bit, and one step back.

For the Afghans, the First Afghan War changed their state forever: on his return in 1842, Emir Dost Mohammad inherited the reforms made by the British and these helped him consolidate an Afghanistan that was much more clearly defined than it was before the war.

Indeed Shuja and most of his contemporaries never used the word “Afghanistan” — for him, there was a Kingdom of Kabul which was the last surviving fragment of the Durrani Empire and which lay on the edge of a geographical space he described as Khurasan.

Yet within a generation the phrase Afghanistan existed widely on maps both in and outside the country and the people within that space were beginning to describe themselves as Afghans.

Likewise, today the taste of freedom they've had over the last twenty years, especially for women, will probably mean the Taliban's rule will be more moderate and maybe short-lived than it would have been.

[xoggoth]

Hope you're right on that. Most societies do evolve eventually.

As for the ISIS K thing, maybe we need AI self-flying drones that wander the world and bomb anyone who looks like a terrorist. What could go wrong?

[xoggoth]

Maybe we will learn someday that forceful interventions and occupations won't force changes on societies. Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, show it never works. Better to encourage evolution with sensible cooperation. Societies can only change slowly, it's a generational thing.

[BigDataPro]

Now with the pile of latest weapons available to Taliban, Pakistan's 'Taliban movement in Pakistan' a.k.a. 'Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan' has an upper hand which is worrying moderate Pakistanis. It is also worrying Iran which is a majority Shia population as opposed to Sunni Talibans. China is playing friendly with Taliban for now but they have their concerns too.

Is the sudden withdrawal a check to China, Iran and Pakistan - all in one shot? It could be!

[AtW]

Sudden withdrawal is a check on Biden’s mental abilities

[OwlHoot]

Turns out one of Pen Farthing's stray animals was on a watch list!

[vetran]

as predicted.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...g-tuk-tuk.html

'Vaporised' on a tuk-tuk: Two ISIS-K Kabul bomb plotters were killed by US drone strike while riding on the back of a three-wheeled motorbike in northern Afghanistan

• Two senior ISIS-K operatives who plotted the Kabul airport carnage were killed in an American drone strike
• Pair were riding a tuk-tuk and died immediately and an associate was injured
• Defence chiefs at Pentagon refused to release the names of the dead terrorists

[AtW]

Why would not they release names of those "senior operatives", as they are supposedly dead now anyway? It's not like it's now secret that they were known to US

Only sensible explanation is that they are not senior, maybe not even operatives.

[vetran]

Why would not they release names of those "senior operatives", as they are supposedly dead now anyway? It's not like it's now secret that they were known to US

Only sensible explanation is that they are not senior, maybe not even operatives.

Oh God I hope I can afford my tin foil hat1

FTFY